By Arthur H. Bleich– In the 1966 movie Fantastic Voyage, a team of scientists and their submarine are reduced to microscopic size and inserted into the bloodstream of a colleague to remove a blood clot in his brain; a procedure too risky to do surgically. Science fiction? Of course­– but a thriller all the same. By 2001, scientists have shrunk a digital camera, lights and a radio...

By Christine Pentecost– I have a beautiful, scenic image in my collection that begged to be displayed larger than could be output by my desktop printer– which only can use letter-sized paper. Surely, I thought, there must be some way to solve this problem and, as it turns out, there is. Image Splitter is a very simple-to-use (and free) software program that takes an image and quickly...

By Arthur H. Bleich– In the 1966 movie Fantastic Voyage, a team of scientists and their submarine are reduced to microscopic size and inserted into the bloodstream of a colleague to remove a blood clot in his brain; a procedure too risky to do surgically. Science fiction? Of course­– but a thriller all the same. By 2001, scientists have shrunk a digital camera, lights and a radio transmitter to fit into a vitamin-pill-sized capsule...

By Christine Pentecost– I have a beautiful, scenic image in my collection that begged to be displayed larger than could be output by my desktop printer– which only can use letter-sized paper. Surely, I thought, there must be some way to solve this problem and, as it turns out, there is. Image Splitter is a very simple-to-use (and free) software program that takes an image and quickly divides it into sections which can then be sized to...

By Arthur H. Bleich– If you currently sell (or would like to sell) prints of your best work here’s a technique I’ve used successfully to assure buyers that if they resell my photographs some day it can be proven that they are genuinely mine and not unauthorized copies. I began doing this a few years ago when a friend who sells prints at art shows and fairs in this country traveled overseas and found copies of his work being sold...

By Arthur H. Bleich– Resolution goes hand-in-hand with almost every aspect of digital photography– from image capture to the final print. If you want your photographs to be the best they can possibly be, it’s necessary to have a basic understanding of it. At first, it may seem confusing because many who try to explain it often use the wrong terminology or throw lots of numbers around which only makes things worse. This is my...

By Tim Grey– In many cases a print will not reflect the full level of shadow detail as actually exists in the image file. Instead, that shadow gets “blocked up,” similar to the way shadow detail gets clipped in an exposure that is too dark. You can compensate for this issue by essentially brightening the value of black, causing all neighboring tonal values to be brightened up accordingly. With the vast majority of printers I find that...

By Nitsa Malik– The fastest way to add a new dimension to a picture is to open your photo editor and insert an additional layer which contains texture on top of your original photo. Textures are usually a photograph or a scan of another image, such as peeling paint, distressed or scratched surface and even vintage paper. These textures can be added on top of your own photo and merged with it by changing the blend modes and opacity...

Red River Paper has just posted a comprehensive field review of Epson’s new printer/copier/scanner that can bring the cost of printing photos and greeting cards way down. Blog Editor Arthur H. Bleich put the printer through its paces for more than four months and printed hundreds of photos on different Red River Papers –and at all the printer’s resolutions– and the results were revealing, to say the least. The ET-2550 uses only...

By Arthur H. Bleich– For years I wanted to take a circular saw and cut the numerical pad off of my keyboard. The the last time I used it must have been…I don’t even remember. But there it sat, just taking up space and putting my mouse just beyond a comfortable reach. Then, one day, tucked away on the Web, I found two companies you’ve probably never heard of– Fentek and Matias. Fentek has the largest collection of specialized PC (and...

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past decade, you know just how coveted Nik imaging software programs are. Google bought Nik in 2012 and has announced that as they focus on long-term investments in building photo editing tools for mobile use, including Google Photos and Snapseed, they’re going to make the Nik Collection desktop suite available free. Actually, insiders say Snapseed was the prime target but Google had to...

Flip a Tony Bonanno coin and it’s a winner either way it lands. Heads, it’s an internationally renowned photographer based in Santa Fe, New Mexico who travels worldwide to shoot architecture, travel, documentary, corporate events, editorial and fine art photography. Tails, a talented digital print maker who works with both Epson and Canon large-format printers and outputs images for other pros. Bonanno is recognized as a Master...

By Arthur H. Bleich– In the early days of amateur photography, enthusiasts were always being warned to “keep the sun at your back” because films were slow and needed lots of light to record a decent image. But before photography became the beloved hobby of the masses, Victorian studio photographers had discovered that the best way to light their subjects was to avoid the sun altogether. They set up indoor studios with...

By Arthur H. Bleich– There are few things more chilling than to see this message pop up on your computer screen during startup: “This disk is not readable by this computer.” Is your data still on the hard disk? Is it a software problem? A hardware problem? A connection problem? What happened? If it’s your internal drive that’s gone south, you won’t even be able to get online for help. You get that numb feeling of fear. Well, hang in...

We all love to add a little bit of personal touch to our Christmas decorations and gifts. How about printing your own Christmas tags? We went over to NorthpoleChristmas.com and downloaded the free template, picked out a couple of our favorite Red River Papers (see which in “Resources” below) and voila – adorable Christmas tags. If you are using Photoshop, you could even personalize the tags with the font of...

By Drew Hendrix– Electronic greeting cards may be click ‘n easy but the public still has a voracious appetite for printed cards; all it takes to enter the market and start making money is a printer, the right Red River Paper card stock and, of course, your best images. The Greeting Card Association estimates that more than 7 billion paper cards were sold last year at prices ranging from $2 to $10 and that women accounted for...

By Arthur H. Bleich– In 1966, Richard Baker aimed his M-16 at the Vietnamese; today he uses an arsenal of analog cameras to shoot them. His goal is to photograph all 54 ethnic tribes in the country where he was once sent to fight. Now 68, the twice-wounded Army veteran has been back to Vietnam about 15 times since the war ended; he jokes that he’s done more tours of duty there than any other soldier. Capturing images on pin-hole and...

By Arthur H. Bleich– Chances are you already know about different post production work flow techniques that can be used in Photoshop and/or Lightroom after you’ve shot your pictures. But it’s equally important to establish a workflow you can follow before you even make the shot. Here are nine things you should think about before you lift the camera to your eye. I’ve grouped them so when you begin to follow this recipe you only...

By Drew Hendrix –Today’s selection of inkjet papers provides amazing creative opportunities for photo enthusiasts by offering quality, control and cost savings previously unknown to photographers who worked with conventional photo papers. There are many more options to let you match the paper’s surface to suit your photographic style. Weight, texture, shade and more can finely tune the look and feel of your prints. Never in the...

By Bryan Peterson –As the years have gone by, I have been pushing myself further and further away from the “obvious” photographic opportunities and more toward the “unseen,” as well as toward creating images from “scratch” (i.e., using props and/or models, and creating compositions that are in fact inspired in part by observing the world around me or simply writing down those ideas that seem to pop...

By Tim Grey– Variability. I am often asked whether it is best to use a full backup solution where the backup is replaced each time you perform a backup, or an incremental backup where only changes made since the last backup are copied. My answer is to use both of these approaches. There are advantages and disadvantages to each type of backup, and so I encourage you to use more than one approach to help make up for the limits of each...

By Tim Grey– To me a big part of why I capture photographic images in the first place is to preserve memories that are important to me. By definition, if I intentionally pressed the shutter release button on the camera then the photo I captured is important to me in some way. Therefore, I want to make sure that my photos are stored in a way that minimizes the risk of loss. Hard drives fail—all too often—and I want to ensure that a...